In Denmark, approx. 100,000 cars get recycled per year. The number has been falling in recent years, and the reasons can be found in the COVID-19 and energy crises, which mean that Danes hold on to their older car a little longer before replacing it. But overall, there is a large number of cars every year nationwide that end up with the Danish car recyclers, according to Lise Korsgaard from Salling Autogenbrug.
A scrap car that arrives at a car recycling center to be scrapped weighs approx. 1,000 kg.
At the car recycling center, the car is environmentally treated. This means that it is drained of environmentally hazardous liquids and other parts which, in one way or another, are dangerous to the environment. After this, the car can have a short or long life in the scrapyard by the car recycler. It depends on how many usable parts are still on or in the car.
Just like organ donation. The car never gets to drive again. When the auto recycler decides that there are no more salable parts left on the car, it goes through the hands of the auto recycler one last time to remove the parts that must not be on the car when it ends up in the recycling industry’s shredder after its last journey, and as in best meat grinder style, shreds the car into different fractions.
Much of the car can be recycled, but approx. 300 out of the 1,000 kilos end up as waste. Landfill or incineration.
On a national level, over the last 5 years, on average, 100,000 cars have been scrapped per year. If we multiply it by the average waste per car, it will be 30 million kilos of waste.
In Skive in Central Jutland, a car recycling company has challenged that reality and questions why there are not stricter requirements for the residual waste in the cars in an industry which, in so many other areas, is constantly faced with stricter legal requirements and framework conditions.
‘Siblings at Salling Autogenbrug – L-R, Lasse Haubo, Lise Korsgaard and Mads Haubo
“In our environmental certifications and other environmental inspections, we are scrutinized whether we exceed the maximum storage of environmentally hazardous liquids, whether our staff has the necessary conditions to handle the cars environmentally correctly, and our systems are reviewed to ensure that the entire environmental management, the documentation and monitoring, are carried out. But there are no requirements for the auto recyclers to dismantle materials that can easily be recycled in other industries”, says Lise Korsgaard, who, together with her two brothers, runs Salling Autogenbrug.
At Salling Autogenbrug, since 2022, they have extracted all residual materials from the scrap cars they receive before they are sent for scrap. This means that they deliver clean bodywork, completely disassemble the car and sort the different fractions they pull out of the cars. This has resulted in them now having a huge material exchange with sorted types of plastic, glass, seat belts, airbags, rubber strips, seat foam, textiles and much more, all of which make up the 300 kilo that under normal circumstances ends up as waste.
Nonetheless, there is no financial motivation for this green project the Jutland company has started. In fact, in several areas, they are “punished” for being green.
“When we send a car for scrap, we get a price per kilo. It is calculated from the full weight of the scrap car. Regardless of the fact that 30% of the car is waste. This means that when we extract what we think is approx. 200 kilos from the car before it is scrapped, yes, then we get 200 kilos x the current kilo price less per car”, says Lise Korsgaard.
Punished for recycling, rewarded for sending to waste
But it is not the only place where the company is opposed, as the conditions are today.
“In addition to the fact that we get less money for each car, we also use resources to extract all these residual materials. It takes a lot of hours, tools and resources, and it takes up a lot of space.
Next, we have expenses for wages, memberships and marketing dollars in an attempt to set aside the remaining materials, which we can then sell to other industries. Finally, and probably also the biggest unknown in this calculation, are all the materials we cannot sell – we have to pay for the disposal. And it can add up to large sums. E.g. do we have to pay DKK 250 per ton to get rid of laminated glass for recycling, which is the windscreen of a car. That’s a lot of kilos. So, if we left it on the car, we would get a kilo price for it, but then it ends up being incinerated. If we peel it off before scrapping the car, it can become new glass. So, we have to pay to send it for recycling but get paid to let it go to waste”, says Lise Korsgaard.
With the help of Salling Autogenbrug, through several EU projects, they have received advice on this green transition and have worked towards being able to reduce their waste percentage by 20% in recent years. It seems to have succeeded, but not with a financial gain – yet.
Lise Korsgaard believes that there is a financial gain ahead.
“We can already see that we can get a higher price per kilo for the precious metals, which are normally recycled through traditional scrapping, but at Salling Autogenbrug, vehicles are delivered as even cleaner fractions, as all residual materials from the car are sorted by hand. E.g. wiring harness and brake discs, we get a higher price per kilo for the cleaner it is.
We then also find a salable spare part every now and then, which previously would not have been profitable to spend time peeling off, but when the car is completely disassembled anyway, it is ready to put in storage.
But still, nothing that matches the expenses and lost profits that are the rules of the game on the green playing board in the auto recycling industry as it appears today.”
It is in no way a lament. As I said – we can just leave everything on the car and get money for it. But it surprises me that it is not rewarded in any way, by, e.g., regulation of waste charges, which we are still charged even though we do the work we do”, says Lise Korsgaard.
At Salling Autogenbrug, they are curious as to why it is not a requirement to extract more from the cars when it is common knowledge that there is a scarcity of many of the resources that are wasted by the current scrapping scheme.
“After all, we are only masters of our own business, but we hope that we can demonstrate a business model so that other car recyclers are motivated to do the same so that together we can significantly reduce the CO2 footprint in our industry”, concludes Lise Korgaard,
who, however, also expect that rules and framework conditions will be changed within the foreseeable future, which will force the industry to think in an even more sustainable direction.
